Do some Uber drivers pick up at Sea-Tac illegally? Yep

Port may allow Uber, Lyft, others to pick up soon, but drivers and riders have workarounds

Updated 5:30 pm, Tuesday, August 11, 2015

Uber and other ride-hailing companies may gain legal access to pick up riders at Sea-Tac Airport soon, but some drivers and riders are already making arrangements by working around the system.

Uber and other ride-hailing companies may gain legal access to pick up riders at Sea-Tac Airport soon, but some drivers and riders are already making arrangements by working around the system.

Do some Uber drivers pick up at Sea-Tac illegally? Yep

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For taxi drivers and ride-hailing drivers alike, the thousands of travelers flying through Sea-Tac Airport each day are a veritable goldmine.

Yellow Cab Seattle has an exclusive contract with the Port of Seattle to provide on-demand pickup at Sea-Tac. Prior to that, STITA taxis held the exclusive contract.

But app-based ride-hailing companies like Uber, Lyft and Sidecar want a piece of that pie, too, and the Port of Seattle Commission is edging closer to issuing recommendations that could allow ride-hailers to pick up riders at the airport.

Ride-hailers are already allowed to drop passengers off at Sea-Tac -- they're just not supposed to pick them up. But they do it anyway.

Uber won't let customers request an uberX from the airport, but drivers on the forum pointed out that customers will simply drop a pin on the highway outside the airport. The drivers then call to confirm.

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"They are almost always at the airport," wrote LookyLou, who is registered as a Seattle driver on uberpeople.net.

Passengers can get an UberBLACK or Uber SUV from the airport, as those operate under chauffeur and limousine rules, said Brooke Steger, general manager for Uber Seattle.

As to people working around the rules to get rides from the airport on uberX, Steger said Uber can do little to stop them -- it's up to the Port to enforce its own rules. And it shows that people want to use uberX and other services in tech-rich Seattle.

"The fact that people are gaming the system just speaks to the fact that there is a demand there that needs to be met and the port might as well gain revenue off of it," Steger said.

The revenue Steger is talking about would come from per-trip fees that could be a part of recommendations expected next month. Steger said Uber would support a system that allowed the company to track and report its trips from the airport each month, paying fees on a per-trip basis.

Other airports around the country are wrestling with the same issue. San Francisco became the first airport in the country to allow Uber, Lyft and Sidecar last October, with a pilot program to see how things might go. San Francisco also developed a GPS "geo-fence" that allows the airport to track ride-hailing cars directly, and it intends to sell the technology to other airports around the country.

Port officials have acknowledged that companies are skirting the rules, as Mark Reis, managing director of aviation division, said at a commission meeting in May. But it's nearly impossible to regulate them since drivers arrive in unmarked personal vehicles and the transaction doesn't look any different than a spouse or a friend picking someone up at the airport, he added.

Last year, Uber drivers were warned by Port ground transportation staff 32 times and fined 11 times, while Lyft drivers got seven warnings and one fine. Through May of this year, one Uber driver and 19 Lyft drivers were warned and a combined 32 were given fines. Each violation is $150.

Taxi companies across the country have lobbied against ride-hailing services from the start, and continue to fight them on airport pick-ups.

Seattle Yellow Cab general manager Amin Shifow said he would welcome the competition from Uber and others -- if they were competing on a level playing field. But he doesn't think they are now.

"We all know their whole business model is based on not following any rules," Shifow said.

He pointed out that while taxis have a designated space away from the curb where private cars pick up incoming passengers, services like Uber and Lyft are picking people up and dropping them off at the curb.

And Uber, at least, would like to keep it that way under any agreement they might make with the port, Steger said.

"I think we're more than willing to work with the Port on a solution that works," Steger said. "I just want to ensure there's enough space for curbside pickup to ensure both riders and drivers are safe."

And of course, Yellow Cab pays a hefty annual fee to the Port -- an amount that equates to roughly $18 million over the life of the five-year contract that is set to expire this year.

Any recommendations from the Port are likely to include a fee for ride-hailers to pick up at the airport, but what the structure will look like is still a relative unknown.

The Port has been holding meetings on the issue over the last few weeks, and has hired a consulting firm to research ground transportation options, said Perry Cooper, aviation public affairs manager for the Port.

Recommendations are expected to be released in September, and those will go up for public comment before anything final moves forward.